Spatiotemporal Changes in Leaf Area and Carbon Sequestration of Terrestrial Vegetation in China over the Last Two Decades

Abstract

Spatio-temporal change characteristic in leaf area index (LAI), gross primary productivity (GPP), total leaf area and total carbon sequestration of terrestrial vegetation at different geographic regions, provinces and land cover change types over China during 2000–2018 were clarified, respectively. The net increase in total leaf area and carbon sequestration over China from 2000 to 2018 is 1.7491 × 106 km2 and 1957.36 TgC, and Southwestern part contributes the most with a contribution of 25.3% for leaf area and 20.1% for carbon sequestration, respectively. The overall contribution of northern provinces to enhanced carbon sequestration capacity is greater than that of southern provinces, with a maximum for Inner Mongolia, even though southern provinces have a much higher leaf area increase. The annual increase rates of LAI and GPP in returning cropland to forest–grassland and artificial restoration of forest–grassland are higher than that of self-rehabilitation of rapid growth stage for planted young vegetation. However, due to self-rehabilitation of forest–grassland has the largest area percentage of 59%, it contributes the most to the increases of leaf area and carbon sequestration among different land cover change types, except for northeastern China, where improved farmland productivity is a dominant factor. It should be noted that the leaf area and carbon sequestration exhibit upward trends in urbanized areas over China. whereas slight increasing and even negative trends are also observed in southwestern, southern, and eastern China (e.g., Shanghai), where artificial surface construction occupied more cropland during urbanization processing. Compared with climatic factors, LAI is the dominant factor influencing GPP increases over China since 2000, and gradually weakened coupling relationship between LAI and GPP is observed from north to south. For climatic factors, GPP is dominantly affected by precipitation in northern parts and by solar radiation in southern parts.